Peaces, Helen Oyeyemi [best life changing books TXT] 📗

mesmerising me. Listen, I think Honza was there in that gaze. There was a look he gave me often. A God, we’re so pathetic and I fucking cherish that look. As if we’d teamed up for a three-legged race and had the peculiar dignity of crossing the finish line behind everyone else on the planet. Yeah, Honza was there. All too briefly; I don’t think “my” Honza Svoboda would have given us the kicking Yuri Don’t-Ask-About-My-Surname did.

Very soon after the kicking, Ava Kapoor crossed over from the sauna car with a mongoose on each shoulder.

* Xavier disputes this recollection. However, since the kicking stopped immediately after this disputed statement was made, I’m leaving it in until Xavier is able to supply an alternative yet similarly influential factor.

20.

She stayed near the door for a few seconds, holding on to the button that held it open, and all four of us wriggled towards her, ducking blows from Yuri’s pirate sword, which he was using like a cricket bat, swinging away at our heads.

“Ava, look …”

“Ava, you’ve got to—”

“Ms. Kapoor, you must see this, you must see what he’s doing—”

“Ava—”

What must that have been like for her? We probably looked and sounded like a pandemonium of parrots that had been cooped up for weeks. Our squawking contortions. Our bloodied drool.

At that point, even though she’d been so cold, bathing and reading books while Yuri bullied us, we still believed Ava was going to vanquish Yuri or take up our cause in some other way. So we wriggled on, preparing to lie at her feet until she relented. But Árpád and Chela held us at bay, and Ava made straight for her sleeping compartment, steering the widest possible berth around each one of us. Yuri lowered his sword and gave her a thumbs-up as she went. “Loving this new no-nonsense attitude,” he said to her. “Ava Kapoor, Ava Kapoor, the most rational girl in town!”

She hesitated before stepping into her cabin. “You’re not getting up?” she said to us. Xavier and I got death glares, but she was less sure she understood what was going on with Laura and Allegra. Her gaze trembled over and around their wounds.

Xavier raised his bound hands. “OK, but if you could just—”

“No, you’ve put on your little show, and you spoilt the bazaar, and you’ve made it clear what I’ll have to tell Dr. Zachariah tomorrow—”

(“What are you going to say to Dr. Zachariah?!” we all said, more or less at once. Yuri included.)

“… so get up, everyone, and let’s get going again. And as for you two Shins! You’re a disgrace. I’ve seen the state of dormitory carriage, and I expect those beds to be stripped by the time we drop you off. I mean it. You’ve had a whole two carriages for your private use and it wasn’t enough …”

“Oh, those two always want more, Ava,” Yuri said, nodding sagely. He walked over to the lounge area and took a seat. Árpád and Chela kept monitoring him, sizing up their chances of jumping him, but he never let go of the pirate sword.

Xavier looked at me and mouthed, What? I mirrored him, and Allegra rested her bruised forehead on her steepled hands while Laura made one more formal plea for Ava to look over her shoulder—just over there, at the chair that was now facing Ava’s sleeping compartment. Laura began to describe the details for Ava. The wetsuit, the full-faced diving mask, the pirate sword. She trailed off as she listened to her own description. But she’d briefly sparked Ava’s interest: “You’re seeing all that over there?”

She flicked a brief glance at Yuri. I mean, directly at Yuri. We all saw it. Disconcerted, he waved at her. Had eye contact been made, though? That was less certain. Ava turned back to us. “Come on, guys. I’m sorry if I worried you earlier. And this—it’s almost flattering that you’d go to this much effort … but … it’d be lovely if you’d just get up and we could put this behind us.”

Allegra, head still pressed to her fingertips, said faintly: “Ava. Beb. I don’t know how to describe this situation to you in a way that isn’t going to piss you off, but if you untie just one set of hands … doesn’t matter which … we’ll all be free very soon, and—and then we’ll be on our way to the doctor … within the …”

Ava was already at her side, an arm around her as she rummaged through floor-level drawers for a knife suited to rope cutting. We could see a number of questions occurring to her as she sawed away, but for the time being she contented herself with one.

“Allegra, who did this?”

Yuri leapt to his feet, excited. “Přem! Tell her it was Přem. Say: He sends his regards, and then burst into tears. Go on. I’ll give you a tenner.”

Ava touched her forehead to Allegra’s. “Allegra.”

“Allegra,” Yuri said. “Pssst, Allegra. Twenty pounds cash in hand if you tell her she’s the one who did this.”

Then he asked me if I’d lend him twenty pounds. Ava spun around when I told him to fuck off.

“It was someone named Yuri,” Allegra said, taking the knife. She tried and failed to cut through her ankle ties.

“Yuri?” Ava looked to the rest of us for confirmation.

“Yuri,” Laura declared, hands patiently outheld for her turn with the knife. “Yes, it was him.” Xavier said the same, and so did I. Yuri, it was Yuri.

Most galling of all, he was right about using the name Přem. When we swore to this new name, “Yuri,” it must have sounded as if we were trying to populate the train with various baleful spirits. But I really don’t know. I keep trying to allow for the doubts Ava must have had, but I still think that in her place I would have listened to us and believed us, just believed us. I would’ve done that first and then got the